Final budget deficit doesn’t call for staff reductions

A city budget for the coming fiscal year which maintains city staffing at current levels will go to the City Council for approval at its May 13 meeting.

At its final budget review session Monday, the council heard an overview from City Manager Kip Spear on the budget.

As it now stands, the budget calls for spending to exceed revenues in the city’s general fund by about $303,000. That would reduce the reserves in the fund from the current $4.5 million to $4.2 million by the end of the 2013-14 fiscal year next April 30.

The initial budget proposal had the shortfall in the general fund at more than $600,000. The council directed Spear to reduce planned expenses so that the general fund deficit would be $200,000.

One of Spear’s proposals was to reduce minimum shifts in the fire department from five men to four, saving some $90,000 a year in overtime costs. He also proposed to eliminate the part-time community service officer position in the police department.

But Mayor Bruce Tossell and Councilmen Duane Gillespie and Bob Kuntz opposed those changes, saying they felt reducing the minimum number of firefighters on a shift could jeopardize public safety.

Councilman Mike Yaklich, on the other hand, argued that it is vital that the council deal with budget deficits, and that it should be possible for the fire department to respond effectively to fires with four firefighters on duty.

Yaklich stressed that he wasn’t calling for layoffs in the fire department, but merely for cutting down on calling in off-duty firefighters to work overtime to cover shifts when other firefighters are sick or on vacation.

The budget assumes no major increases in city funding sources like the state income tax and sales tax, and assumes that the decline in property tax revenues the city has seen in recent years will continue.

The council has been setting funds aside for several years to meet expected expenses, and the budget reflects this.

For example, the budget includes $400,000 to replace the membranes at both of the city’s reverse osmosis water treatment plants.

There’s also $55,000 for a new roof on the Pleasant View Cemetery mausoleum, $100,000 for a new front-end loader for the street department and $55,000 for the fire department. Some of the fire department funds would be for refurbishing a used fire engine the city recently purchased.

The most expensive project on the horizon, though, is a new water well. Spear says the city’s Well 3, next to the Baker Park golf course on Madison Avenue, isn’t producing enough water.

Spear estimates that the well project could cost $1 million, and while the well won’t be dug in the coming fiscal year, he said, the preliminary work, such as selecting a site for the well, should begin soon.